Enterprise Project Management for R&D

Vaillant Group:  Deep level of insight improves PM efficiency

The Company: The Vaillant Group is an international heating, ventilation and air-conditioning technology concern based in Remscheid, Germany. As one of the world’s market and technology leaders, it develops and produces tailor-made products, systems and services for domestic comfort. The product portfolio ranges from efficient heating appliances based on customary fuels to system solutions for using regenerative energy sources. In financial year 2011 the company, which has been family-owned since its founding in 1874, achieved with about 12,000 employees sales totaling €2.3 billion. 

The Challenge: The Vaillant Group is an innovation-driven company and its R&D department forms the core of the business. With R&D facilities in many European countries and in China, the company was using isolated project management systems that were not interconnected. The company initially worked with SAP project management, which proved a challenge for R&D staff. The Vaillant Group required a centralized project management system that would streamline resource planning and management throughout the group and deliver insight about project status and risks at any time.

The Solution: The enterprise management solution is based on Microsoft Project Server with the addition of several TPG products to extend the functionality of the system. Notably, the Vaillant Group  is using TPG PSLink for integrating SAP with Microsoft Project; TPG ResourceLink to populate the enterprise resource pool with data from any source, including SAP; TPG ProjectLink for sharing information about schedules, across projects; and TPG MTA Server for on-demand milestone trend analysis.

The Benefits: Significant increase in insight into resource availability and workloads, ensuring that projects are completed on time and on budget. Flexible reporting with different levels of detail depending on the recipient. Increased transparency across multiple projects and R&D locations. 

Download detailed case study (PDF)

 

Logo Vaillant Group

Industry: 

- Heating
- Ventilation
- Air-conditioning

Department: 

- R&D

Solution Components:

- Microsoft PPM 2010
- Microsoft SharePoint 2010
- TPG PSLink
- TPG ProjectLink
- TPG ResourceLink
- TPG MTA Server

 

"We can foresee if there is likely to be a delay or a potential bottleneck and act quickly to prevent it. This helps us to ensure that even very complex international R&D projects are completed on time and on budget."

Jörn Fritsche, Project Manager Vaillant Group R&D Support